Collateral Damage

Mount Calvary Lutheran Church, built in 1768 five years after Sharpsburg was founded, was the town's oldest church and a spiritual anchor for the community until it was damaged beyond repair during the September 17, 1862, Battle of Antietam. During the fighting, Confederate troops used the church's cupola as an observation post, and Southern artillery positioned across this high ground drew Union shellfire whose fragments struck the building. The Army of Potomac's Fifth Corps then used the church as a hospital until February 1863, tearing out pews and turning them into crude coffins for soldiers temporarily buried in the surrounding graveyard before later removal to the National Cemetery. The battered church was torn down in 1863 and replaced by a series of newer churches just downhill, the last built in the 1940s, and today an iron fence outlines the site of the 1768 church. Teresa Kretzer, who was 13 years old, recalled being at Sunday school there on September 14 when Rebel cavalry dashed through town, sending children home in terror, while later shelling drove residents into cellars as shells and solid shot whizzed into Sharpsburg; her father, John, estimated 75 people crowded into their basement for shelter during the battle.

Sharpsburg, Maryland · United States